Sunrise brings birdsong: a Tennesee warbler’s blur of high notes answered by a towhee’s interrogatory tweet, and a white-throated sparrow’s “Oh, sweet Canada” giving way to the reedy whistles of cedar waxwings, tut-tutting robins, and a winter wren’s liquid braid.
fall warblers
Overcast but not gloomy. Above the usual yammering of a red-bellied woodpecker, I catch a few phrases of warbler buzz: cerulean, I think.
The rain slackens toward mid-morning and I can hear chirps and twitters: warblers in their muted autumn colors foraging for breakfast in the treetops.
The treetops are full of fog and small birds catching insects. Everything drips. A yellowjacket begins a slow inspection of the porch balustrade.
Light rain accompanying a front. As it tapers off, the yard fills with small birds—yellow-rumped and other warblers combing the leaves for breakfast.
Lightly overcast and cool. A molting warbler skulks in the old lilac, foraging for breakfast on the undersides of leaves.
Fifteen minutes before sunrise, thin fog appears and disappears. A few wood thrush notes. A chestnut-sided warbler’s “Pleased to meetcha!”
Rain and warblers. An earth-shaking blast from the quarry two miles away. The soft susurrus of tree crickets.
Cloudy with 100% chance of migrating warblers: the yard is briefly possessed. I hear a noise, turn my head and meet a rabbit’s critical gaze.
I am mentally marking walnut saplings for removal when they fill with migrants: yellow-rumped and palm warbler, ruby-crowned kinglet.
Sun! The meadow glows goldenrod-yellow. Birch leaves at the woods’ edge tremble with warblers. A mosquito sings her thirsty note in my ear.
Small birds flit through the tops of the locust trees—migrating warblers, no doubt. Birds of passage. Every now and then the cricket pauses.
Breezy and cool. Three phoebes hawk for insects along the woods’ edge while a young pine or blackpoll warbler flits through the goldenrod.
A new bloom of gnats—I saw them swarming by the back door—and the yard is full of fall warblers, foraging with the chickadees and titmice.